


Something Up Your Sleeve

by cellist



Category: Now You See Me (Movies)
Genre: First Fic Written In Years, Gen, J. Daniel Atlas Is A Control Freak, J. Daniel Atlas Needs A Hug, J. Daniel Atlas Overthinks, Luckily He Has Dylan Around, M/M, Movie: Now You See Me 2, My First Work in This Fandom, Possibly Pre-Slash, Post-Now You See Me 2, Pre-Slash, Team Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-07
Updated: 2020-12-07
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:13:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27898105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cellist/pseuds/cellist
Summary: Daniel can't shake the sound of Walter Mabry's words at the market in Macau, nor can he stop his brain from supplying all the things that could have gone wrong.Set after Now You See Me 2, this is a little trip into Daniel's mind. There is implied Atlas/Rhodes in much the same extent as there was in the film, so it's pre-slash at most, but you never know… Just in case I can't continue it, I've written it as a one-shot, but it's also open-ended enough so I can continue it if I get bitten by the bug again. :)
Relationships: J. Daniel Atlas & Dylan Rhodes, J. Daniel Atlas/Dylan Rhodes
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	Something Up Your Sleeve

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! I haven't written fanfic in over 10 years, and for some reason after rewatching the two films this week (as part of my birthday treat to myself), I couldn't shake this little fic off, so here we go. I know it's not a huge fandom and might not even be read, but I've written something! And that's always a plus. I have missed it very much.
> 
> Any comments or kudos is beyond appreciated.

If there’s one thing that Daniel Atlas hated more than anyone knowing what the ‘J’ in his name stood for, it was the feel of cold metal around his wrists. All in all, he’d been feeling it far too much of late. And for a magician who never really cared that much for escapology other than for the sense of ‘ha! Got one over on you’ that came with it, he’d quite happily never see another pair of handcuffs for at least the next five years.

But handcuffs, or restraints of any metal kind, had made their home in his life in much the same way as Dylan Shrike née Rhodes (or was it Rhodes née Shrike, to be more accurate?) had.

So, what had kickstarted this introspected aversion? If Danny were being honest, and as much as he hated to admit it, he disliked being honest to most people, it was the repugnant Tressler and bastard Tressler Jr. The sting that had gone so horribly wrong had brought far too many handcuffs into his life, and certainly at least one pair that he knew he wouldn’t have been able to escape from, had the need really arisen. And that was the punch to the gut. The one thing he couldn’t quite get over. Mabry might have been a spoilt, egotistical, self-aggrandising dick, but he could get his hands on handcuffs that – after an illuminating conversation was had – even Lula couldn’t slip out of. That, combined with his off-hand remark in the Macau market that he had (and Danny had to avoid mental air quotes) plans for much more work for them, and the captivity part of their plan held far more weight than he liked.

He hadn’t mentioned it to the others. They hadn’t been there, and they wouldn’t understand. Lula would ask too many questions. Jack would do the soft eyed confused look that would then make Lula coo over him like some new dove for her act. Merritt… Merritt would see too much, despite Danny knowing that he couldn’t see more than he wanted him to. Usually. And Dylan… Best not to go there. With everything else in Danny’s life he knew how to bring the shutters down. But not with this. This ate away at him night after night. This was something that left visible traces on him in his darkened eyes and paler skin.

 _What if._

It’s something that never bothered him before, but now it did. What if he hadn’t been so impatient with The Eye? What if Dylan hadn’t turned up in Macau? What if Walter Mabry had been just that little bit less narcissistic? What if they hadn’t seen the Lionel Shrike safe being loaded onto Tressler’s lorry?

He flinched. The sharp edge of the desk dug into his palms from where he gripped it so tightly. Control. That’s what mattered right now. Deep breaths and control. Focus on the analysis; focus on the debriefing. So, what was the answer to all of those questions?

They would have been in deep shit. 

Though there’s no one else around to see it, Danny has to bark out a snort at that. Deep shit indeed. 

“Did you actually think I’d let you go.” A statement, not a question. Which equated to some twisted form of modern slavery for the Horsemen, and more illegal dealings orchestrated in Mabry’s name. 

Which also meant more confinement. More restraints. And knowing his own personality, probably more handcuffs. He rolled his eyes. Definitely more handcuffs: if he couldn’t control the situation then he knew he would have done anything and everything to rebel against it. And that would have meant the Tresslers having to find some way of subduing him. 

Let’s just digress for a moment. Daniel Atlas is well aware of his faults. They are many and varied, ranging on a wide scale from mildly irritating to cataclysmically frustrating. And most of those are linked to a lesser or greater degree to his passion for control. That’s the only reason there could be for why he was still obsessing about Walter’s unvoiced plans for them all. Why he couldn’t just... let it go like Merritt, Jack, or Lula had. Why he still had those awful handcuffs from the plane tucked away in his bedroom. And why he was devoting far too much time to learning how to pick them open. Or not as the case was proving to be. But that’s the thing about control, and especially his. It can never slip. It should never be threatened. And most importantly of all, it should never be surrendered willingly. 

Yet here he is. Struggling with that very concept. Daniel Atlas, master magician, learning this late in the game that you _can_ give up control. That sometimes it’s even _needed_ for things to succeed. 

Slowly he released his stranglehold grip on the desk edge, absentmindedly rubbing the marks left behind. He can’t lie to himself for much longer. Not when every permutation of his analyses brings him back to the same conclusion. Out of the five members of their little group, two had been at fault. Admittedly none of them were perfect; Merritt has an overinflated sense of self-worth that could blind him to many subtleties, Lula used self-deprecating humour as a shield worthy of King Arthur with its levels of deflecting, and Jack... well, Jack just seemed (still) too happy to be part of it all. But they still gelled and somehow muted those traits when the team came together on a job. Perhaps The Eye was just being overly tactful by insisting the whole set up was to get them all working as a single cohesive unit. That seemed more accurate, particularly as the two weakest members were also the strongest. Dylan and himself. 

And oh, wasn’t that just a peachy conclusion to draw? Danny raised his eyes to the ceiling, wry smile firmly in place. 

Yes, the two who thought they were in control had been proved that they were utterly, transparently misinformed. Worse than that, the control they had fought for had proved to be the worst thing they could have. It strangled them. It let Danny lead the others into a trap, and it nearly killed Dylan. 

So much for the patented Atlas approach. 

At that thought he turned away from the long forgotten blue prints spread out on the table, and stumbled over to a chair. Sitting down heavily, he rubbed a hand across his forehead. 

There was a lot he needed to work on. A lot that he needed to look at and unpick, and that was as novel an experience as it was unwanted. But then again, their time in Macau had started unravelling a lot of his prior protections. Leaning back into the support of the chair, Daniel tapped his fingertips against his bottom lip. He’d spent so long refusing to allow anyone else an ounce of control, it was increasingly hard to let himself simply exist. When was the last time he had sat and watched the sun set? Or spoken to someone (who wasn’t a Horseman) without an ulterior motive at play?

That last one still needed more work than he wanted to put in, mostly because he found other people generally boring. He’d taken long enough to find Lula actually warranted more than shop talk, and that’s something that still pissed Jack off. But honestly it wasn’t something that had surprised him, and Danny was used to disappointing people with their arbitrary expectations surrounding interpersonal interactions.

Absent-mindedly he picked up a deck of cards from the table beside him. And it wasn’t like he was alone in that perceived failing. Oh no, Dylan ranked right up there next to him. He closed his eyes, resting his head back and he blanked his mind out of everything else other than his current musings.

His fingers warmed up slowly to the cards as he contemplated their erstwhile leader, or co-leader if implication was to be believed.

Control issues: check. Abandonment issues: check. Inability to open up: check. Self-righteous self-belief: …reluctantly also check. Though he’d never have admitted it to Merritt’s face, sometimes his mentalism was grounded more in psychology than was altogether comfortable. And without a doubt they were both of above average intelligence. Though he still liked to think that he was the victor in that.

To conclude, Dylan Rhodes was more than a tiny bit similar to J. Daniel Atlas.

They shared strengths, and they also contradicted each other, but they also – and this was what actually perturbed him – shared weaknesses, too. The question was, what to do about it? Once upon a time the answer would have been easy: ignore it. He was good enough – _brilliant_ enough – to push through anything by sheer power of his will alone. But that once upon a time hadn’t involved near death experiences on a routine basis. Something that he knew would be a recurring event and one that he wouldn’t walk away from just like he couldn’t walk away from The Eye.

His fingers worked on auto-pilot. Faro shuffle into Zarrow shuffle, then the Herrmann pass.

It comforted him. It grounded him. And yes, he smiled softly, it was control. But that all slipped when Dylan was added to the mix. Since he’d met the man his iron fist had weakened, had grown rusty and stiff somewhere between half closed and half open. And for a magician that was more than dangerous. It was lethal. But what could he do? What _should_ he do?

His fingers slowly paused. His eyes flickered open as he tilted his head, an idea slowly crystallising in his mind. It was a very un-Atlas solution. In fact, it was about as far from a solution he would be likely to come up with as it could be. And perhaps that was why he knew that it was the right one. After all, his shrouded fist was still a mystery, partially even to himself. And who better to confide in than the one other person who was afflicted similarly?

The cards cascaded from his fingertips. A wider smile, and the most genuine he’d allowed to grace his features in days, rose on his face. He’d see Dylan. Talk him through what he’d discovered about them both (similar, brilliant, _controlling_ ) and see where it led. As far as Danny was concerned it was win-win. Rhodes understood hating to appear weak. He also understood that somehow their shared experiences connected them, to the extent that even The Eye was seeing them as a partnership. And if there was a weakness inherent in them both, then it stood to reason that together they could disentangle it enough to prevent it becoming a greater threat in the future. And maybe it would only strengthen the partnership, friendship, _thing_ that was building between them both.

Decided, he stood up and strode across his room. But when he opened the door it was to find Dylan Rhodes already standing outside it, his faintly bemused expression echoed by Danny’s own shock.

“I was just coming to see you, and-” He began futilely, but Dylan had already stepped inside, a secretive smile gracing his features.

“It’s about time we talked, I agree. About a lot of things.”

And just like that, with all the style of a consummate showman, Dylan had upended his world once more. A thing that he was doing on a regular occurrence and one that, if Danny were to listen to the tiny voice deep inside him, he rather liked.

But it was never his way to confess all that easily. Although if anyone were to be able to get behind his many blockades, he knew it would be Dylan Rhodes. Just what would happen when he did both terrified and thrilled Danny in equal measure. A small frisson of the forbidden, a temptation too great to avoid. That’s the only explanation he had for shutting the door behind Dylan as he gestured to a chair, and allowed his lips to quirk upwards in his most charming smile.

“Well then, let’s begin.” And from the answering grin on Dylan’s face, Danny knew it was going to be a very interesting conversation.


End file.
